Geevor and the Cornish tin coast

A tin mine left as its last shift found it

Tin and copper have been taken from this stretch of cliff between Pendeen and Trewellard since the late 18th century, and from Cornwall for thousands of years before that. Geevor, from the Cornish Hwel an Gever, the mine of the goats, worked from 1911 to 1990 and produced about 50,000 tonnes of black tin. It ran as East Levant, then North Levant until 1891, and was revived at the turn of the century by St Just miners who had emigrated to South Africa and came home with capital. Next door at Levant the shafts run out under the seabed. The whole coast is part of the Cornwall and West Devon Mining Landscape, listed by UNESCO in 2006, and Geevor is kept as it was left, the dry, the mill and the tunnels open to walk.